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Monday, 9 March 2015

It's that time of year again.

Yes, Spring is here. The days are starting to get noticeably longer and not so cold either. Enough incentive for the most bone idol of us (I am aiming this at myself, so please don't be offended) to get down to the allotment and get some work done. But as I've mentioned in the past, life seems to throw up all kinds of obsticals. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it. This weekend was the first time in two weeks I've shown my face on the plot. A mixture of fetching and ferrying offspring, putting together my new bike, dodging raindrops and not to mention 'Just five minutes more in bed please'. But this weekend I was determined to make it. Only really managed a total of four hours over Saturday and Sunday, but every little helps. This is how determined I was, on Sunday, my daughter and I gathered everything we needed, tools, food, schoolwork. Opened the front door and turned on our heels as it was pouring down with rain. Put the kettle on, made a cup of tea and in true British style, waited for the rain to cease, then set off again. Luckily, we didn't have to wait too long and we had less to carry too, the food was eaten.

Cardboard laid out

Watered cardboard

The main job and boy am I making a meal of it was to press on with my daughters flower bed. I've dug the soil over lightly, removing as many of the thick woody weeds as possible. Covering over with some cardboard (I've put the box the bike came in to good use) then soil on top taken from various spots from the plot. I've also made use of some lawn edging that had been lying around in the shed for years. It's clearly not quite finished, still plenty of soil to add and the edging needs to be better secured.

Over the last few weeks of winter I had put a large upturned flower pot over the rhubarb to try and force it and it's worked. I'm hoping to make at least one rhubarb crumble this year with it. It's had a full year on the plot now so I should be established.

The potatoes are finally starting to chit. Nothing seemed to be happening until I picked one up on Saturday and noticed that they'd been Chitting in secret. Ok, hands up, I addmit it, I had placed the potatoes the wrong way around. From now on I'll think of Bingo, eyes down. I'm hoping to put them in the potato grow bags by next weekend.

I do have quite a few seedlings growing and doing very well, mostly Garden Connect seedlings. So another blogpost should be on its way very soon. Till next time and thanks for reading.